Dear Friends,
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Before anything, I would like to thank anyone who is reading this letter right now. Unfortunately, communicating back home has been a difficult process due to infrequent and poor access to the internet, but the thought of friends and family reading the small bit of information that I've been able to upload here makes me more than grateful for this opportunity.
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I would also ask that you share this site with anyone else who might be interested and who I may have missed in my poor excuse for an e-mail list that I patched together while away. Of course, there are many more stories and experiences to to tell and share aside from what I´ve listed here, but this is a good summary of how thankful I feel now that I can look back on this experience and all of the people who got me here.
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Since arriving in early September, I have been living and working in the small rural community of Sabana Grande, in the municipality of Totogalpa, in the district of Madriz, in the northern part of Nicaragua, which is a country. (just kidding).
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I have been working for a program initiative of the National Engineering University of Nicaragua called Grupo Fenix. More specifically with a group of 26 women who refer to themselves as the Solar Women of Totogalpa. Since 1999 they have been working with their partners in Grupo Fenix in an effort to build a Solar (Powered) Community Center along the main highway to Honduras. Grupo Fenix also hosts courses in rural applications of renewable energy technologies in the developing world, which take place in Totogalpa and are coordinated and managed by the Solar Women. Go to the website for more info www.grupofenix.org or talk to me.
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Being here and observing community organizing, as well as the landscape of renewable energies in a country like this one has been incredible.
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My work at the center has been slow coming. In addition to the language barrier, the resources to support me and other volunteers have been in short supply. Despite that, I´ve been able to work with the women to development a Mission and Vision statement, do some grant searching, help construct a bench, and teach a short course in photography. In addition, and most enjoyably, I´ve been able to chat with Nicaraguans and, in part, assume a way of life I didn´t know existed.
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About a miles walk from the Solar Center is the house that the community of Sabana Grande sometimes refers to as the house of four generations, which includes: a great grandmother of at least 95 years - Doña Lupe; a grandmother - Doña Modesta; a mother - Doña Adelina; and three girls of ages16, 15, and 7, Heyling, Vanessa, and Alexandra. Since early September, I have been living with these wonderful women, who like everyone else in the area have been calling me Juan because they would otherwise have trouble pronouncing the S.
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Living with a family and working with a handful of Nicaraguans in the Solar Center has allowed me to absorb some wonderful and incredible aspects of life in this rural area. Also, thankfully, it has taught me a great deal about myself and where I come from.
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Far and away, I would say that the most wonderful set of lessons that I have been afforded by this experience have been in humility:
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First, I'd say that I've been humbled by the leaps of faith that I have had to take continuously in order to assume a daily lifestyle. This, in turn, has humbled me by the trust that I've had to put in strangers: In the first several weeks, just asking for directions felt like an intimidating task. I think, in part, because I didn't want to further prove my foreignness by sounding like a Gringo in addition to already being white skinned and almost certainly wearing a face that says "I don't know what I'm doing here either." Although I imagine that the awareness of sticking out like a sore thumb can offer anyone a great lesson in the value of self-esteem (that includes all of my friends who are studying abroad) I have been greatly assisted by what I perceive to be a prevailing attitude of generosity, kindness, and a "tranquilo," kind of attitude in Nicaragua that leaves people unphased after strange, grammatically inconsistent requests from a well-meaning foreigner.
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Lesson two in humility has come in the form Nicaraguan cultural values in the field of faith. In my time here, I've been lucky to observe (from the far, far-out sidelines of the countryside) a fervent faith in political institutions in light of the National Municipal Elections, the results of which have been hotly disputed in Nicaragua and around the world. After going to two (loud) political rallies, watching Election Day events in which some neighbors waited 4 hours just to vote, and seeing from an estranged angle the results of my own presidential election, it is very easy to see how awesome the promise of democracy continues to be.
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Part two in the humbling lessons of faith has come in the form of religious faith: living in a house with 6 women, several neighbors have been ready to remind of my privileged position as "blessed among women."(oddly enough, I also ended up spending a holy spirit filled week with 4 Nuns in Managua). This gentle reminder comes with the same humble sense of personal obligation to being thankful to Christ that has preceded every public event that I´ve attended. Seeing this graciousness in the face of such scarcity of material resources makes me feel humbled and gracious in a way that lesson three can shed light on:
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Lesson three of humility: In my effort to improve my ability to speak Spanish, (although its come a long way) my attention is still continually called to those things which I can't express: This would include knowing the verb for ¨to flush¨ which I was sorely lacking last week when I finally found what I think is the only public bathroom in a nearby city where I run errands. This would also include trying to explain to people who have never dreamed about going to college why I chose a ¨career¨ field like sociology.
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In Spanish, English, or any language, I imagine that while some things are hard to explain, others are impossible to express. When I think about how humbled and grateful I feel by all of this - above all - I realize that I can't express the level of gratitude that I feel to all of you who are reading this.
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So, with the faith that I really mean it:
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Thank you.
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-Sean
